—the Messenger of Allah, may Allah bless him and grant him peace—(* at al-Hujfah, parched with thirst, while the people too were thirsty. The Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—then said *) (1):

‘Is there a man who will go with a group of Muslims carrying waterskins to the well (2) of Dhāt al-‘Alam, then return, for whom the Messenger of Allah—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—will guarantee Paradise?’

He then related a lengthy hadith stating that he sent one of the Companions, who became frightened of the jinn and returned. Then he sent another, and some poetry was recited; he too was terrified of the jinn and returned. Then he sent ‘Alī ibn Abī Tālib, who descended into the well and filled the waterskins after a terrifying ordeal. The Prophet—may Allah bless him and grant him peace—said to him: ‘The jinn who called out to you was Samā‘ah ibn Ghurāb (3), who killed Allah’s enemy Mis‘ar, the devil of the idols who spoke to Quraysh through them, and was alarmed by the satire directed against me.’”

Then Shaykh Abū al-Faraj said:

“This hadith is fabricated and impossible. Al-Funayd, Muhammad ibn Ja‘far, and al-Sakūnī have been discredited as narrators. Abū al-Fath al-Awdī said: ‘And ‘Imārah fabricates hadith.’” (4)

I say: The books of Ibn Ishāq transmitted from him by others contain none of this.